Verbal Behavior

Verbal Behavior
Skinner, B.F. (1957)
New York: Appleton Century Crofts

Nominator's statement: A very important impact - it could be said that this book launched the cognitive revolution by creating the basis for its own opposition.

comments

If we use the word "cognitive" to refer to an area of science rather than to a theoretical approach, then this book stands out as the best example of a consistent behavioral approach to the subject of language as a form of behavior.
Including Skinner in the top 100 of cognitive science is like putting Marx in the top 100 Christian thinkers!
This book took behaviorism way too far. It was influential only in the sense that it showed all to clearly how the paradigm could not even begin to account for the complexities of cognition.

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